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Hard learned lessons from Panda

Freelance writers who depended on sites where they were earning upfront payments or ongoing revenue share likely learned some important lessons from the Google Panda update last year. There are some bloggers however, who really didn’t learn a lesson! For example, I tripped over this blog that is so full of garbage that it is really bordering on stupidity. The posts were full of links, keywords and affiliate marketing “lingo” that was so poorly written that it would scare off anyone. One of the problems with these sites is that they do tend to attract those people in a...

This morning I logged into my email and discovered that I had 125 comments waiting for moderation on this blog. While my coffee hadn’t quite kicked in, I was certain this had to be a mistake. After all, this blog is about 3 years old and I have only had about 500 valid comments so this seemed to be quite the catch. I shouldn’t have been so eager to log into my control panel. This is what I found: 101 of the messages were sitting waiting for my “approval” while the others were already in spam. How nice. Guess what...

Freelance writing and reputations

One of the things that many writers do not consider is their own reputation. In some cases, writers develop a reputation for providing high quality work, cooperating with editors and being receptive to changes in the marketplace. Many writers do not think about what can happen to their reputation from blog comments, Facebook and other social networking posts and forum posts. However, these may also play a factor in how a writer’s reputation develops online. Use common sense Writers need to use some common sense when it comes to their online reputations. While many writers specialize in content mill writing where...

If you take a look around the Internet you are going to find a ton of commentary about freelance writing. You can find numerous blogs about freelance writing ranging from those writers who specialize in online writing, those who are highly educated journalists and from those who are still trying to get their feet wet. Chances are that you are going to find a lot of talk about what online writing does and does not entail as well as numerous suggestions about how to make more money from freelance writing. Here are some of the myths about online freelance...

Many online writers depend on clients being able to go to the various sites where they write and find their portfolio. Most writers (myself included) apply for roles and include links to their various work. I’m guilty of the same thing! Recently however, I had several emails from people who found me online and wanted to know if I would be willing to write a series of articles for them. They “found” me through Google and looked at some of the articles I’d written. However, there are some simple ways to create an easy to use online portfolio. One...

SkyWord provides an interesting option for freelance writers offering the best of two worlds: First writers can earn up front payments and second they can earn revenue share. I am going to discuss the “Bounty” program since this is the only one that I am participating in at the moment. Signing up with SkyWord Like most other writing sites, SkyWord will ask you to register with a user name, password and provide your PayPal email address.Unlike many of the sites today however, SkyWord will not request that you provide a writing sample (yet)! The registration form is straightforward and does not...

There are a number of well respected freelance writers who will take on any assignment if it means making a dollar. I think this is great because after all, someone has to write to fill needs of clients. I am not one of those writers, in fact, I’ve turned down so many assignments that it’s almost laughable when I think about it. Comfort zones and speed One of the reasons that I tend to ignore topics that I have no “general” interest in is that I value my time (highly). The more comfortable I am with a topic, the faster I...

Writer’s often spread themselves out and write for numerous sites in order to ensure a constant flow of work. Many sites rate writers based on some “secret” formula that is not always evident. One of the problems with these rates is they may or may not reflect the “vision” of the person who is using the work but instead is being rated by an editor. Editors are human beings too, but in reality, it is largely their jobs to evaluate the work that is submitted based on criteria set down by the site who is paying them for input....

Writing sites often make serious demands on writers time but they can also provide a steady source of income if they are used in a manner that is sensible. In our last section, we discussed Textbroker and explained why it works for a writer who is looking for quick and easy assignments to fill in larger gaps of time. However, what happens when you have only short periods of time available to you? Some writers can benefit from using Crowd Cloud. Before you get too excited about this, I want to point out that Crowd Cloud is a site...

Working smarter not harder: Why Textbroker works

Nearly anyone who writes online is looking for additional ways to make money. Writers know that time is money and that every minute they have to waste finding a new client, exploring new writing sites or any other task that does not involve writing means they are losing out on receiving payment for that time. However, there are some things that can help fill in time if writers would simply take the time to explore them. Many writers turn down assignments because they do not pay enough, or because they feel they are beneath them. In reality, this isn’t...

Make the most of oDesk: Part 4 Assignments

Assignments are the lifeblood of your freelancing career. This is true whether you are a brand new freelancer, a seasoned freelancer and applies regardless of what platform you are using to obtain freelance work. Once you have landed an assignment, there is far more involved than completing the work successfully and getting paid. Each assignment provides an opportunity to (a) ask for more work and (b) ask for referrals. These are crucial. However, before you get to that stage, there are some things that must be done to make sure the assignment is completed successfully. Communication: Make sure that you...

As many of you who follow this blog regularly know, I seldom (if ever) do product reviews. I do review websites where writers can make money, review social media sites and evaluate offers of companies who are considered bogus. However, a month ago I did a review on the Forever Lazy one piece pajama that has been all over television. I admit this “review” was not all that flattering either. Well, it appears that something in my post triggered something because I’ve been getting traffic from some interesting keyword searches including: 109 forever lazy size chart, 36 forever lazy...

We nearly all have issues with last minute Christmas gifts! In fact, chances are that with less than 48 hours left on the Christmas Countdown Clock that you have at least one or two other people on your list that you simply do not have a clue what to do and with the stores and malls promising to be a nightmare today and worse still tomorrow, you probably are just about ready to give up. Not so fast! There are some last minute gifts that you can still take advantage of even if you don’t have a lot of...

This may seem like it is a bit premature however, as the fall begins to creep upon us, soon many of us will be busy with deadlines, holiday shopping, families visiting and more. Once the children have begun to go back to school, it is generally a good time to start considering what your goals are for the upcoming year. Before you know it (just over 100 days away) year end will be here and it will be too late to prepare for the new year. Here are some of the things that you can do to prepare for...

SEO for Freelancers: Panda changed things

For many freelance writers, SEO work was fairly simple to do, you used a specific set of keywords a certain number of times in an article. The irony of this is that sometimes SEO phrases that didn’t make a lot of sense wound up in articles, making them search engine friendly (hence the name search engine optimization) while nearly ignoring the reader. The goal was simple: Provide fair to middle of the road content on a regular basis that would attract the attention of the search engine bots that spider your site. Today, this is no longer a good...

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Featured

Hard learned lessons from Panda

Comment spam a real head scratcher

Freelance writing and reputations

Myths about online freelance writing

Online portfolios matter

Writing Site Reviews: SkyWord

Comfort zones matter

Writing rates and work quality

Working smarter not harder: Crowd Cloud

Working smarter not harder: Why Textbroker works

Make the most of oDesk: Part 4 Assignments

Accidental keyword ranking – who knew

Last Minute Christmas Gifts

Goal Setting: Time to prepare for 2012

SEO for Freelancers: Panda changed things

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